National Express Coventry
National Express Coventry is the current trading name and brand name of West Midlands Travel Ltd (part of the National Express Group), a company which operates local bus services from its depot in the city of Coventry in the West Midlands County of England. The operating area is mainly within the Coventry urban area which is covered by Centro the West Midlands integrated transport authority in terms of public transport infrastructure and Warwickshire County Council. All other bus depots of National Express UK Bus in the West Midlands County operate under the name National Express West Midlands. National Express Coventry previously operated under the trading names of Travel Coventry, Travel West Midlands and West Midlands Travel. History In 26 October 1986 West Midlands Travel Ltd came into existence, and stems from the 1986 deregulation of the bus industry in England and Wales. It was previously the bus operations of the West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive (WMPTE) which had originally been the separate operations of the Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Walsall, West Bromwich and Coventry Corporations. Then from April 1995 the company was purchased by the National Express Group and in September 1996 was re-branded to trade under the name Travel West Midlands. On 9 December 2002 the Coventry depot attained a more local identity and began trading as Travel Coventry and from 4 February 2008 'National Express Coventry'.National Express Group - "New brand, new name, new era" became the new name for Travel Coventry. Network Review An entire network review took place on the 26th February 2012, which resulted in frequency improvements on key corridors in the city"New bus network is announced for Coventry" . Many routes were extensively revised or renumbered whilst there were some routes which were removed and others were introduced. The new network is designed to be simpler. Since then extensive service monitoring, reliability checks and public feedback have resulted in some further minor timing changes to some services to further improve the punctuality of services to their customers. The new network is colour coded and the colours of routes are displayed on the network map and on timetables, the buses themselves are being route branded to match these colours. Route 21 is the first route to have the new route branding applied. The previous network review was conducted on the 2nd April 2006. Fare Structure A flat fare structure is in operation within the Coventry boundary; people can travel on almost all of its buses, and to almost everywhere on its network, for a fixed price. Graduated fares apply on route 11 & 11X to/from Kenilworth & Leamington Spa. As with some other urban operators, no change is given for security and speed of boardingWhite, P. (2008) Public Transport - Its Planning, Management and Operation. A range of fares are available including singles and daysavers and their own travelcards which are available for 1 week, 4 week and 52 week periods of validity. Off-peak, evening and group tickets are also available. Also Network West Midlands multi-operator tickets are issued and accepted on the companies buses within the Coventry boundary and to/from Keresley. Competition Other operators in Coventry include Travel de Courcey mainly operating orbital services around Coventry, Blue Diamond with two tendered routes, Johnson's of Henley-in-Arden and Stagecoach in Warwickshire with mainly inter-urban services. Vehicle Types The following table is a summary of the current passenger service fleet which totals 150 vehicles : Table footnotes: *Two offside seats in front of stairs on upper deck otherwise similar to Volvo B7TL with TransBus ALX400 bodywork **Four offside seats in front of stairs on upper deck otherwise similar to Dennis Trident 2 chassis with Alexander ALX400 or TransBus ALX400 bodywork Since July, 2009 all of National Express Coventry's buses are low floor. Named/Special Buses 4453 a Dennis Trident double decker bus is painted in Coventry Corporation colours to commemorate 100 years of Coventry Transport."New bus celebrates 100 years of travel in Coventry" 1875 a Scania Omnilink single decker bus is named after Bernard Delaney a previous managing director of National Express Coventry. Route Branding (Coventry) PrimeLines PrimeLines is a partnership between National Express Coventry, other bus operators, Coventry City Council and Centro to deliver high quality bus corridors in Coventry complete with real-time information, bus priority schemes and modern buses. See also *List of bus operators of the United Kingdom References External links *National Express Coventry website Category:Transport in Coventry Category:National Express Group companies Category:National Express Coventry Category:National Express bus operators in England